“Thanks for the ride, Oliver.”

“No prob, Bro,” Blake’s brother replied, nonchalantly. “I was running out of internet anyway.”

Blake snorted and shook his head. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw his brother’s arm shaking as Oliver gripped the steering wheel with white knuckles.

Should I take over driving?

After a few seconds of silence, where Blake remained undecided, Oliver broached a new subject. “So… How long until I can start leveling up and stuff like you?”

He glanced up to his brother’s eyes. “You won’t, at least not like me. Non-combat classes are different, remember?”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” Oliver dismissed his concern. “That’s what I meant.”

“Well, Metal, my companion, said we can build an Alchemist’s Workshop after we upgrade the Faction Hall to level three.”

“The floaty guy, right. How long is that gonna take?”

“That’s the problem, we don’t know.”

“How do you not know?” Oliver complained. “Aren’t you from the future?”

“Yeah, but I never dealt with any of this in my past. I just fought monsters with my team. After we were done, we all hung out at the bar.”

“Sounds great,” Oliver smiled.

He shook his head. “Not really. Sure, there were some good times. But, you, mom, and dad were all dead. Most people’s families were,” he trailed off.

“Yeah, I can see how that’d suck.”

After that, the conversation stalled. Once Oliver left the reservation and entered Pinetop, Blake asked, “Is the bunkhouse finished yet?”

“How the hell should I know?”

Blake sighed and messaged his mother through the interface. A moment later, he was informed that it was, indeed, completed.

“Okay, change of plans. Drive me to the fire tower.”

Oliver glanced over. “What’s going on?”

“Now that the bunkhouse is finished, I’m going to move in. I’ve got a lot of gear stored at the fire tower that I need to transfer over before it gets stolen or something. It’s kind of just sitting in there.”

“Where’s this fire tower at?”

Blake gave his brother directions to his temporary housing. Oliver grumbled under his breath at the redirect, but complied.

Once they arrived, he opened the passenger door of the old diesel truck and stepped out to the ground below. “Can you help me carry stuff down?”

“Yeah, sure,” his brother agreed.

As they navigated the metal stairs, Blake heard Oliver slip behind him. When he asked if his brother was okay, he received a curt reply to mind his own business.

Touchy.

When they climbed through the trap door entrance in the floor to enter the enclosed area, Oliver whistled. “You weren’t kidding, there’s a lot of crap here. You trying to start your own ren-fair?”

Blake snorted and then gestured toward the overflowing pile. “No, this is to outfit our combat teams so they don’t die before they reach level one.”

“Aren’t we rich now? Shouldn’t we be buying riot gear, Kevlar, and guns?”

He shook his head. “No, this is way better, trust me.”

Oliver reached down and picked up a recurve bow. He looked over and stated, rhetorically, “You expect me to believe this thing is better than a machine gun?”

“If you mean for killing? Then no, a machine gun will work better. But, the machine gun won’t get you any nano either. It’s doing all the work, not you.”

His brother frowned and sat the bow down. “What about the armor?”

“Honestly, this stuff is kind of on par with riot gear and Kevlar. Almost all of it is level one stuff and either gives you attributes or has stuff like self-repair.”

“Wait, this can give you stats?” Oliver’s interest piqued as he turned over a pair of gauntlets in his hands. “Like, in a video game?”

“It’s NOT like a video game,” Blake barked, suddenly upset with his brother’s comparison. “That kind of thinking gets people killed.”

Oliver raised his hands defensively. “Chill out, bro. I was just askin.”

Finally, Blake conceded. “Yes, if you put on a ring that gives you Physical Power, you’ll get stronger and faster.”

“Can I have a set, then?”

“This is for fighters, not non-combatants,” Blake replied.

“You sure about that?” His brother glanced around the small room and added quietly. “Looks more like it’s for collecting dust.”

You know what, why not. It won’t hurt, and it’ll make him happy.

“Sure, you can have some gear. But, if one of the combat teams needs it, you’ll have to give it back.”

“Sure, sure,” his brother easily agreed and dove into the pile. After considering multiple pieces, he suddenly stopped. He retrieved four separate rings, slid them on his fingers, and raised his hand into the air. In a faux deep voice, he stated, “Now I have ultimate power!”

Blake laughed and then corrected him. “Not really. Only one of those rings is working.”

“What do you mean?”

“Check out your status,” Blake urged him.

Oliver frowned. “That’s lame. It only raised my Magic Stamina. Who the hell designs a system like that?”

“The Architect.”

“Why does he only allow one ring to work when I got ten fingers?”

“It, not he. It’s an AI, remember?” Blake corrected him. “And I have no clue why. I’ll be sure to ask it next time we meet up for drinks,” he added sarcastically.

Oliver grasped his chest as if he were wounded. “Don’t be a hater,”

Blake rolled his eyes. “What you want is one earring, a necklace, and a ring. Each one needs to give you a different attribute. Since you don’t have spells, I’d go with Physical Power, Stamina, and Resistance.”

“What about the armor?”

“You planning on fighting any monsters any time soon?”

“No, but it can give stats too, right?”

“Yeah, but you can only raise an attribute once. You could raise one of your Magic attributes, but you’d never notice it. There’s no point.”

Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

“Lame…”

Blake helped his brother sift through the pile until they found jewelry that increased all three of his physical attributes. Once they were equipped, Oliver gasped.

“Holy crap! This is fire! I feel like I can run ten miles and lift a car!”

“You might be able to run ten miles, but it’ll take a LOT more to lift a car.”

“You sure I can’t fight like you?”

Blake reached down and retrieved a long sword from the pile of weapons and handed it over, hilt away from him. “Here, hold this out.”

Oliver frowned, but complied. He extended his arm, directly out from his body. “Done.”

Blake watched as his brother tried to hold the weapon still. At first, Oliver’s hand was somewhat steady. However, after a few seconds, the light tremor transitioned into a chaotic shake, and he was forced to drop the weapon.

“Okay, you made your point,” he said, bitterly.

“Sorry, Oliver, but I don’t want to lose you again. You don’t want to fight monsters anyway. It sucks.”

“Whatever. Let’s just get this crap downstairs.”

For the next thirty minutes, he and his brother transferred equipment to the truck bed in silence. Oliver’s increased attributes were a great boon to the effort, even if Blake carried the majority of the weight. Once they were finished, Oliver drove them to their property, three miles away, and parked on the field, next to the completed bunkhouse.

Jordan kneeled next to a vent off his father’s new kitchen, with some sort of tool. When Blake exited the truck and slammed his door, the constructor gave a brief wave of greeting before he returned to work.

“You’re gonna live in this piece of crap?” His brother asked in disbelief.

He glanced first at Oliver, and then the primitive building before he answered, “Yeah. I was sleeping in a fire tower, after all.”

The bunkhouse resembled an unstained, two-story log cabin, with thatch for a roof. It was forty feet long and twenty wide, with a single entry. Windows were spaced evenly along the side, yet no glass fit inside them, only slatted shutters.

“Why, when you can sleep at mom and dad’s?”

“This is just what it looks like at level one. Trust me, it gets nicer later on.”

“If you say so…”

“Here, grab some gear and help me bring it inside. I’ll want to show you something.”

“Okay…”

Oliver removed a jerkin and pair of bracers, while Blake retrieved a bundle of weapons. He held the heavy implements in his left arm effortlessly as he strode over to the front door and opened it.

When he glanced back, he noticed that Oliver moved with greater confidence and ease than before.

Inside, the floor of the small foyer was lined with planks of rough wood. Two hallways split off, one per side, which led to four bedrooms each. Opposite them was a stairwell, which climbed to the second floor.

Blake climbed the wooden steps, his brother directly behind him. Once upstairs, he strode down the hallway until he came to a stop before the last door. He reached out, grasped the doorknob, and opened his interface.

After a brief pause, he smiled and opened the door.

The room was small, only eight feet by eight feet, and was empty of furnishings. He knew that their woodworker, Jason, could fashion him furniture, but there was no point when they could purchase anything they needed from the store.

Blake entered the room and sat his bundle of weapons down against the far wall.

“Ugh!” Oliver grunted. “What the hell! Why can’t I come in?”

“THIS is why I wanted to store the stuff here. You aren’t on the approved visitor’s list, so you can’t enter,” Blake informed him, as Oliver tried and failed yet again to walk through the doorway. His brother dropped his load of armor and raised his hands to the entrance. They slid smoothly over an invisible barrier.

“Crazy…” he whispered. His face displayed his shock at the advanced technology.

Blake focused on his interface and added his brother to the list of people allowed to enter. Suddenly, Oliver fell forward when the field meant to keep him out disappeared.

He stumbled into the room and gave Blake a dirty look. “Not cool, bro, not cool.”

Blake laughed.

“You’re really gonna live here? There’s not even a bed here!”

Blake nodded. “Once we get the gear up here, I’ll claim the room next door. Then we can go to the store, buy a bed, maybe a chest of drawers and a nightstand, then bring it up here.”

“And what about a bathroom and shower?”

He grimaced. “No shower yet, but there’s one privy per floor.”

“Privy? What’s that, like a pit toilet?”

“Essentially.”

Oliver wrinkled his nose in disgust. “The future sucks.”

“It does,” Blake agreed.

----------------------------------------

“This is amazing!” Blake announced, mouth full of food, as he devoured the roast chicken breast.

“Bussin,” Oliver agreed.

“Yeah, thanks for the food, Mister Summers,” Jason added, while his friend Owen nodded enthusiastically.

Jordan swallowed and added in a southern accent, “Appreciate the invite.”

“I’m glad you like it.” Peter grinned broadly, happy to get back to work.

After gratitude was shared, the table grew silent as everyone focused on their food. Almost every faction member sat around a long table within the newly constructed cookhouse. Only Mister Grayburn, their landlord, and Brent, their second constructor, were absent.

Kuruk nodded his thanks as he consumed a plate full of potatoes and carrots. The native was the only one present without chicken on his plate. He had informed them that he was a vegetarian and politely declined the offered meat.

“So, this stuff will boost our stats?” Oliver asked.

Their father shook his head. “No, I need to use monster meat and add nano for that to happen. I want to try it out, but Blake will have to bring some food back first.”

“Next time,” Blake confirmed and took another bite.

“Besides, all this food was sitting in storage at the restaurant.” Peter gestured around the table. “I didn’t want it to get freezer burned or go bad.”

Donna frowned. “If you have to use nano every time you make food, where will it come from?”

“I’ll get some from directives,” Peter replied, unsure of the answer.

Blake swallowed. “Don’t worry about it. Once we get enough people living here, we’ll have a working economy and people will start paying for food.”

“What if they can’t afford it?” his mother asked.

“Unless they lie around every single day doing nothing, they’ll make plenty of nano to eat,” Blake responded. “Every non-combat class has directives that give nano, and they can sell anything they make to someone else who wants it.”

“What about stone?” Owen asked in concern. “Not many people want blocks of rock from the quarry.”

He shook his head. “Don’t worry, the faction will pay for everything you mine once we switch over.”

“Why not start now?” the stonemason pressed.

“We’re already paying you cash, that was the deal,” Blake reminded him. “Besides, we don’t even have taxes set up yet. Don’t worry about it. We have plenty of time to set up the economy before Invasion day. That’s still over four months away.”

“You mentioned we can bring our families.” Jordan began in his southern twang. “When does that happen?”

“Honestly, I’d suggest on Invasion day. Monsters won’t start appearing for a few days afterward, and they’ll be more likely to move if they see the proof in front of their eyes.”

“My Ex will likely need to see a monster face to face,” He agreed. “Does that mean my son can’t come by until then? I have custody this weekend,” Jordan explained.

“No, that should be fine,” Blake responded, and then realized he did not know when that was. “What day is it?”

“Friday,” his mother informed him.

“Oh, so you’re going to bring him by tomorrow morning?” Blake asked in confirmation.

Jordan nodded.

“I’m surprised you’re working on the weekend.”

Jordan nodded toward Donna. “Your mother mentioned how important getting the faction hall upgraded is. I figure the faster I can help build up this town, the more people we can save when it all goes to hell.”

“Thank you, I appreciate that.” Blake said quietly.

“Me, too,” Oliver added, while Donna smiled.

“How long until we can upgrade?” Blake asked.

“Well, if I work through the weekend and Brent comes back on Monday, I figure on Tuesday we’ll see what we’ll need.”

The faction hall upgrade required specific off world materials, which could only be gained by completion of scenarios. Unfortunately, the upgrade option was grayed out and provided no information.

According to his companion, when the upgrade was finally available to them, the town interface would provide a list of materials required. Once that list was detailed, Metal was confident he would be able to describe those materials in great detail.

Blake could only hope he recognized them and remembered which scenarios they appeared in. Otherwise, it could take weeks of trial and error before they gained the resources required.

I’ll worry about that next week. In the meantime, I have some grinding to do until I max out my attributes.

At twenty million nano per attribute enhancement, he would need to gain one hundred and eighty million before he hit his level one cap. If all went well, he could complete two level two Mander scenarios per day, and hit the maximum in two days.

Afterward, he would begin to save up to evolve each of his spells. Each evolution required fifty million nano, as well as the requisite experience in their use. Only after all four spells were evolved would he attempt a level three Mander scenario.